1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a connector device to be conveniently used with a steering system of an automobile and more particularly to a connector device comprising a combination of two different electric connecting means of a slip ring and a cable assembly.
2. Prior Art
An automobile steering system typically comprises a warning horn switch attached to the steering wheel of the system and, in recent years, there has been a tendency that a switch of an air bag system, a switch of an audio equipment control system and other switches are additionally attached thereto. For this sort of attachment, since the steering wheel is, although in a limited sense of the word, a rotatable member of an automobile, it is necessary to provide a rotatable connector means between the switches carried by the steering wheel and an appropriate fixed member of the automobile to ensure electric connection therebetween.
There have been known two types of connector devices; one called a slip ring which utilizes relative rotation of a ring-shaped conductor body and a scraping member which is frictionally contacted with the conductor body, and the other called a cable assembly which utilizes a cable wound into a plurality of turns between a movable member and a fixed member. The former has the advantage of small dimensions (particularly in the axial direction) but is less capable of maintaining the stability of electric connection for a long time, while the latter is more reliable in terms of electric connection but becomes (axially) voluminous as the number of connection channels increase. Therefore, these two alternatives have their respective merits and demerits.
In order to overcome the above mentioned disadvantages, there has been proposed a connector device comprising two rooms (compartments) which are provided between the movable case and the fixed case of the device and appropriately separated from each other to respectively accommodate a slip ring and a cable assembly. In this device, the circuits which require highly reliable electric connection such as those of an air bag system are electrically connected by way of a cable in the cable assembly and the circuits which are not significantly affected by noises and chatterings such as those of a horn system are electrically connected by way of a slip ring in order to enhance the overall reliability of the connector device and confine its axial dimension, the width of the cable assembly can be reduced by the amount which is replaced by the circuits of the slip ring.